


Silver

by navree



Category: Twin Peaks
Genre: F/M, I mean it takes in a bit, and much more angsty, but as with all my diane and dale stuff, canon may have started to redeem itself after the finale, even though it was weird as fuck, like this is more concretely romantic than some of my other stuff, tbh I feel eh about this but I had it in my head, this does NOT take into account anything we've learned throughout the revival
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-05
Updated: 2017-09-05
Packaged: 2018-12-23 23:37:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,639
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12000312
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/navree/pseuds/navree
Summary: It's a glimmer of a fragment of a moment, suspended in time and disjointed from the real world, but she'll take it. She wants it.He's been back from Twin Peaks for months. She's known something was off for weeks. And then she falls asleep.





	Silver

**Author's Note:**

> There might be a bit of a lull in Twin Peaks things while I work on a super long Hamlet thing, as well as some original content, for which I apologize in advance. But any requests or questions about anything I write here can always be directed to navree.tumblr.com while I do some more intensive work.  
> as always, comments (either positive or constructive) are always welcome and much appreciated!

The sting in her eyes she gets whenever she's tired and the sting in her eyes she gets whenever she's about to cry are very similar. In recent days it's been hard to distinguish them, as fatigued and as stretched thin she's been. Diane feels pulled, yanked, in a thousand different directions, and every time she tries to find her own way there is always someone else to tug her back to their own agenda. It would be almost comical if it wasn't so infuriating. 

Albert is the only one who even remotely believes that something is wrong. Everyone else assumes that he's the same, because there's no concrete and outlandish proof to suggest otherwise. In the workforce, Albert is the only one to know him as well as Diane does, but he's chalking it up to something akin to post traumatic stress or nerves from having to deal with that infernal town. She shouldn't put that much faith in Albert, as no nonsense as she is, but she needs someone, _anyone_ , to believe her, to see what she sees. To realize that Dale Cooper isn't really Dale Cooper anymore. 

The shifts are subtle, bordering on minuscule, but Diane has spent so much listening to his thoughts and sharing in his life that she notices them. His affection is more predatory, his smile crueler, the lines in his face meaner. Something's changed, something drastic, but everyone brushes it off. _No Diane_ , they assure her, tone bordering on patronizing. _Everything's fine. You're just not used to having him back in the office. He's the same he's always been._

It makes her want to scream. He's not the same; Dale Cooper had a light in his eyes that couldn't be extinguished no matter how hard anyone tried. This thing that they all assume is him doesn't have that. She wants to do something about it, wants to get people to see that something's gone wrong, something's gone off. Diane's even contemplated her own trip to Twin Peaks at a point, if only to try and figure out from its unique and intriguing cast of characters what happened while Dale was with them. 

Instead, all Diane can do is curl in on herself, tug the blankets of her bed up to her chin, and attempt to do something about her lack of rest, since she can't do anything about the pit of dread in her stomach. 

The darkness flickers for a moment, like she's in a pitch dark room with shoddy light fixtures. Eventually, it stops fluctuating and vanishes altogether, leaving Diane in a room she doesn't recognize, a room with bizarre silver lighting that's completely devoid of any furniture or decoration, wondering how she managed to get herself there. It takes a moment to realize that this must be a dream, or a hallucination, or a drug induced haze. She would hope it's the first option, seeing as she's never hallucinated or participated in recreational drug use in her life. She's also alone, although she feels as if someone is watching her. 

" _I know how to use a gun!_ " Diane isn't sure who she shouts this to as she turns, but it makes her feel braver in this strong dreamscape. There's a small laugh, and she whirls back around, and this time she isn't alone. 

Dale Cooper has always had an appreciative look on his face whenever she's been around him, and in her more prideful moments Diane likes to think she's the cause, but he's never looked at her like this. Like a blind man seeing the sun for the first time. Like they haven't seen each other in months. In the back of her mind, this should be confirmation of her suspicions, that the person in her waking life is not Dale Cooper, is something else entirely. But her mind has gone blank, and her throat has gone tight, and her eyes are stinging again. 

"Dale?" Perhaps it's because it's a dream, or perhaps she's just incredibly disoriented, but he's in front of her the moment she says his name. She wants to touch him, aches to touch him, and her fingers tremble in the space between them, mere inches from his skin. She could, if she took just a step forward, brush them against his cheekbones, push his hair back from his eyes, trace the outline of his face. She nearly does, and his eyes flutter closed in something akin to anticipation. 

She turns into a statue at the last second. 

"Is this real?" It's a ridiculous question, she knows, but she needs to fill the silence, and the question burns on her tongue. "Are you..." She wants to ask if he's here, but he isn't, not if this is in her head, but she wants this to be the product of some type of consciousness transference technique or something he's studied in the throes of his eccentricities, rather than Diane simply wanting something so badly her brain tries to make it so. 

"Diane." The way he says it is different, as if he's forcing it out between a closed up throat, as if it's the first word he's spoken in months. His hands don't hesitate when they comb through her hair, smooth over her shoulders, and she shudders at the touch. "It's real. It's me." It's music to her ears, and for what feels like the first time in weeks, Diane feels a thread of warmth in her veins. 

"Why?" 

"It's complicated to explain." The warmth turns to irritation, in spite of herself, and her eyes turn skyward. 

"Not really Dale," she persists, although she keeps herself under his hands. "Why are you in my head, and _not_ in Quantico, with us, like you _should_ be?" She doesn't mean for it to sound like an accusation, but her nerves are frayed to the point of breaking, and a part of her wants to grab him by the shoulders and shake him until he comes _home_. 

"I want to explain. But I can't. I don't even understand half of it myself." Her eyes drop, and in an instant Dale's fingers are under her chin, tilting her gaze back up to meet his. It's too much, a sensory overload after months of deprivation from the real Dale Cooper, and she needs to squeeze her eyes shut. She knows that this isn't eternal, that this isn't even happening in the actual world. It's a glimmer of a fragment of a moment, suspended in time and disjointed from the real world, but she'll take it. She wants it. She has missed him too much to reject it. "But Diane, you _have_ to know, _have_ to remember...Whatever he does, he's not me." It's the confirmation she needs, to realize that she was correct in her assessment that the Dale she's been working with these past weeks isn't her Dale.

"I knew it," Diane whispers, voice hoarse, and his smile is small and sad and broken but a smile nonetheless. 

"I need..." He stops for a moment, searches for the right words to say. "I need you to remember me. However long it takes." It's her turn to feel broken, and her fingers come up to capture his hands and lower them between their bodies, keeping her gaze fixed on them. 

"How?" He gives her a slightly confused look, and again she wants to shake him. "I can't love a ghost forever." 

"I'm not a ghost." Diane sighs, even to her own ears it's a sad sound. "I'm me." 

"You are." And he is Dale, with that intangible spirit that makes him who he is, that makes him so easy to care for. She looks at him again, and her vision blurs ever so slightly. "But you're _not here_." It hurts to say it, the same way it hurts to live it. He may be with her now, in this bizarre dream that's real in its own bizarre way, but only here. And only for however long it lasts. Somehow he's incapable of staying, incapable of leaving wherever he is that's kept him stuck and away, incapable of coming back. And Diane is incapable of finding him.  

"I'm not a ghost," Dale says again; she's biting on her lip hard enough to draw blood and suddenly they're only centimeters apart. 

"I know." Her voice cracks. Her fingers finally touch his skin, brushing along his jaw, and if he was a blind man seeing the sun for the first time, she is a blind girl memorizing him through touch alone. His eyes are ringed with red, and there's a lump in her throat she struggles to speak past. "I love you." It's a whisper more than it is a promise. 

" _I love you too_." 

His voice cuts off like something chokes him, and in a second Diane feels his lips on her's. She's felt it once before; she wonders if Dale remembers. She does, in some corner of her mind, but all she can focus on for the moment is how much she missed him, the real Dale and not the perversion that's been passing itself off as him. He shivers under her hands for a brief moment, and presses just the slightest bit harder against her. They part, only a bit breathless, and Diane just has those three words stampeding through her head, those three words and nothing else. _I love you_. 

"But not forever." Does she say it as a reminder? Is she simply thinking out loud? Is she trying to convince herself? Diane isn't sure if it's one, all, or neither. Dale's only response is to nod, swallow thickly, and brush a thumb along her cheekbone. Diane lets her eyes close at the touch, and lets a gasp stutter past her teeth. 

When she wakes up, her cheeks are damp. 

**Author's Note:**

> I'm...I have mixed feelings about the finale. I like that they brought Diane back, and I like that the essentially confirmed that if Dale and Diane weren't involved before he left, they at least wanted to be. But everything else, and I do mean everything else, weird sex scene included, was just so bizarre, and I'm still trying to figure out how I feel about it.


End file.
